Hero versus Antihero in Classic Western Movies
The Movie High Plains Drifter Contrasted with the Movie High Noon
Sep 21, 2009
High Noon starred Gary Cooper, a popular star of screen who played many roles as the typical noble hero. High Plains Drifter starred Clint Eastwood a popular star of the “Spaghetti Western” (Westerns so named because they were of Italian origin and filmed in Spain). Eastwood often portrayed an antihero lacking virtues in the spaghetti westerns.
The scriptwriter for the movie High Noon was Carl Foreman. The basic story: Frank Miller and his three-man gang are coming to kill Sheriff Will Kane on his wedding day. The killers intend to murder Kane at noon, and the movie follows the events that transpire as Kane spends the one hour until noon trying to find someone in the town to help him.
The Movie High Noon has a Moral
“(Carl) Foreman (who was later blacklisted by the House Un-American Activities Committee - HUAC) admitted that he wrote scenes in his film (High Noon) to make sure the audience knew he was protesting HUAC” (Barra, page D7). Thus, the movie represented real-life elements and mirrored events in society.
As a side note the movie Rio Bravo was a response to the movie High Noon, and Rio Bravo writer Howard Hawkes complained “I didn't think a good sheriff was going to go running around town like a chicken with his head off asking for help. . . . (in making Rio Bravo) We did everything the exact opposite of what annoyed me in High Noon" (Barra, page D7).
To return to the comparison of the movies, High Plains Drifter and High Noon, the hero of the classic western often protected frightened residents. The sheriff Will Kane from High Noon had a “death before dishonor” attitude, and although Kane strikes one insensitive townsperson and knocks him to the floor, Kane doesn’t seek vengeance or condemnation of the townspeople.
High Plains Drifter and High Noon – Antihero vs. Hero
In High Noon a pivotal scene in the church occurs when Will Kane arrives searching for citizens to aid him. After some dissension and disagreement, the citizens agree that their financial interests outweigh the interests of the lawman, Will Kane.
One churchgoer expresses the town’s gratitude to Will Kane for protecting the town and making the streets safe. But he adds that Kane should leave, and allow the town to capitulate to Frank Miller and handle the matter themselves. They fear that a large gun battle will discourage investors and visitors and could lead to financial ruin. At the movie's conclusion, Sheriff Kane confronts the Miller gang and survives the encounter.
How does the movie High Plains Drifter compare? Clint Eastwood, the star and director of High Plains Drifter, explains that he began with the question “what would have happened if the sheriff of High Noon had been killed. What would have happened afterwards?” and wrote the move High Plains Drifter as the answer (Eastwood, pp. 99-100).
High Plains Drifter had originally been written by Ernest Tidyman. Eastwood explains that as written by Tidyman, “the sheriff’s brother came back to avenge the sheriff and the villagers were as contemptible and selfish as in High Noon. But I opted eventually for an appreciably different approach: you never know whether the brother in question is a diabolic being or a kind of archangel” (1999, p. 100).
An Example of a Movie Antihero
Eastwood’s character, the nameless lead in High Plains Drifter, typifies the antihero. In the antiheroic western "The hero is no different from the villain, the victim no more innocent than the victimizer” (Bloch quotes Harmetz, p. 105).
The movie begins as the character of the drifter enters the town. Before 20 minutes have elapsed the drifter has killed three men and raped one woman. Afterwards, the frightened townspeople impressed by his gunplay and heedless of his crimes, hire him to protect them from a vicious gang recently released from prison that will arrive the next day.
The drifter demands full control of the town as payment for his protective services, but makes absurd demands such as forcing the residents to paint their entire town red, evacuating the town’s hotel (but the drifter resides there), destroying buildings in the town and using the lumber to make picnic tables, and renaming the town “Hell.”
Eventually the gang that the drifter was hired to eliminate returns to the town, but instead of protecting the townspeople the drifter leaves. He returns only after much of the town is burned to the ground, several people are dead, and the remaining frightened townspeople cower in a building capitulating to their tormentors.
The drifter brutally dispatches the ex-convicts who are threatening the townspeople and departs. In the final scene as he survey the remnants of the town, a townsperson states "I never did know your name."
“Yes you do,” the drifter replies, and the camera focuses on a tombstone that says “Marshal Jim Duncan, Rest in Peace,” implying that the drifter is the ghost of Jim Duncan.
Some argue that the drifter character is a cruel, amoral rapist, but others argue that the tale of the High Plains Drifter is an allegory and the drifter is an avenging angel of sorts who destroys the town as penance for the evil of the town inhabitants. Both characters, Will Kane and the drifter, have power beyond those of most mortals, but the nature of the drifter’s is that he is self-serving while Will Kane is self-sacrificing.
Which is better the hero or the antihero? The best advice is to watch both movies and draw your own conclusion.
References
Barra, A. (2009). 'Rio Bravo,' still popular and hip at 50. Wall Street Journal. Mar 26 Issue.
Bloch, A. (2006). Deconstructing the American mythology: revisionist Westerns and U.S. history. Williamstown Mass. Williams College.
Dirks, T. (n.d.) Main Film Genres: Westerns. Western Films. AMC. Filmsite.org
Eastwood, C., Kapsis, R., Coblentz, K. (1999). Clint Eastwood: interviews By Clint Eastwood. Miss. University Press Robert E. Kapsis, Kathie Coblentz
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